Yeah, I think a lot of the 401k saving advice assumes really low interest on debt, or really high return on savings. It doesn't make sense to me to make low payments on my insanely high student loans, sitting at 7% or whatever, and meanwhile make less than 1% in savings, or 2% in a CD, or whatever. My parents put my college fund in the stock market, and ended up losing more than they put in, so... unfortunately sometimes it's really hard to figure out the best way to really save.
Either way, right now I'm still in school, making a net loss, so I can't save at all.
My 401k spending comes out of my paycheck - 6% pre-tax... I don't even miss it. Since my work matches up to 6% ...it's a no-brainer. The earlier you start, the more you save...the more interest you gain. Is not investing $100/pay period (or whatever you can afford) worth having to work well into your 70's? For me, the answer is no. And if you have that much debt that your worried about, I would hope that a huge, lavish wedding wasn't a priority. But that's just me.
From working oncampus and other savings, I had about $5000 saved to use for gradschool expenses/living on my own. I'm not in gradschool, but I am living on my own. I did some math, and I've spent about a fourth of that, and will earn it back and start to save again soon. (I couldn't find work for about a month and a half and had a lousy budget.)
Ideally I'd like to put some of that money into a Roth IRA or a CD, and then a savings account for gradschool, I just wonder how having a Roth IRA, CD, and savings account would affect my financial aid. My family was lucky and we never had to take out loans for my undergrad, and I hear getting aid for gradschool is difficult.
hey.. i've got a small ($2k) Roth IRA, and i don't think it affected my financial aid at all. i'm not even sure the FAFSA asked about it (which would make sense, since technically you can't touch the money until you're old and grey). if you've got money on a CD or in a savings account, you will have to report that.
if you're looking to sock away money and not hurt your chances of grad aid, see if you can deposit it into a niece or nephew's account (this entirely presumes you have a niece, nephew, and/or sibling sympathetic to your cause who will let you store your money in there temporarily until you're done applying for aid).
one last thing- getting aid for grad school can be difficult, especially if you're going for humanities. try to hit up more prestigious schools. they tend to have larger endowments and are more generous with their grants than public universities.
Haha, going for my MSW, and two smaller private schools. I'm just debating on whether I do it full time, but maybe have problems paying for my apartment, or part-time and I think part-time affects financial aid as well. (I want to focus on elders, my professor was convinced that all the gerontology students would be rolling in federal aid with the babyboomers retiring. Jokes on us.)
Right now my dad put my money into his savings account and will send me a little bit once a month or so. (He gets the bank statements mailed to him, I view them online.) However if think I would want a separate account from his savings so I could monitor it better and budget better.
oh. your other option would be to kick it old school Great Depression style, take your money out of the bank, and hide it in your house. (my grandmother liked to stash hers in between the roof beams in her attic.) because, technically, the FAFSA and your taxes only ask how much you've got in savings, as in, a savings *account*.
The advantage to contributing to a 401k is your company will usually have some kind of matching program. For example, they may match your contributions up to 5% (which is excellent). That is free money you really don't want to miss out on.
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Either way, right now I'm still in school, making a net loss, so I can't save at all.
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As far as retirement goes, I haven't even been able to start saving. For me, a house comes first. Then I can start saving for retirement.
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Ideally I'd like to put some of that money into a Roth IRA or a CD, and then a savings account for gradschool, I just wonder how having a Roth IRA, CD, and savings account would affect my financial aid. My family was lucky and we never had to take out loans for my undergrad, and I hear getting aid for gradschool is difficult.
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if you're looking to sock away money and not hurt your chances of grad aid, see if you can deposit it into a niece or nephew's account (this entirely presumes you have a niece, nephew, and/or sibling sympathetic to your cause who will let you store your money in there temporarily until you're done applying for aid).
one last thing- getting aid for grad school can be difficult, especially if you're going for humanities. try to hit up more prestigious schools. they tend to have larger endowments and are more generous with their grants than public universities.
Reply
Right now my dad put my money into his savings account and will send me a little bit once a month or so. (He gets the bank statements mailed to him, I view them online.) However if think I would want a separate account from his savings so I could monitor it better and budget better.
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